at all hours and grossly inflated prices. I parked further down the street and pulled on a floppy green vel¬vet cap and a pair of granny specs with clear glass to com¬plete the transformation from desolate widow to total stranger. They didn't really go with my Levi's and beige blazer, but fashion's so eclectic these days that you can mix anything if you don't mind looking like a borderline care-in-the-community case or a social worker.
I walked back to the corner, noting the heavy grilles over the window of Sell Phones. I paused and looked through to an interior that was all gray carpet, white walls, and display cabinets of mobile phones. A good-looking black guy was leaning languidly against a display cabinet, head cocked, listening to a woman who was clearly telling the kind of lengthy tale that involves a lot of body language and lines like, "So she goes, 'You didn't!' and I go, 'I did. No messing.' And she looks at me gone out and she goes, 'You never!' " She was a couple of inches taller than I was, but slimmer through the shoul¬ders and hips. Her hair was a glossy black bob, her eyes dark, her skin pale, her cheekbones Slavic, scarlet lips reminding me irresistibly of Cruella De Vil. She looked like a Pole crossed with a racehorse. She was too engrossed in her tale to notice me, and the black guy was too busy looking exquisite in a suit that screamed, "Ciao, bambino."
I peered more closely through the glass and there, at the back of the shop, sitting behind a desk, head lowered as he took notes of the phone call he was engrossed in, was Will Alien in all his glory. I might not know his real name, but at least now I knew where he worked. I carried on around the corner and there, in the back alley behind the shop, was the Mazda I'd last seen parked outside my house the night before. At last something was working out today.
Now for the boring bit. I figured Will Alien wouldn't be going anywhere for the next hour or two, but that didn't mean I could wander off and amble back later in the hope he'd still be around. I reckoned it was probably safe to nip around the corner to the McDonald's on Cheetham Hill Road and stock up with some doughnuts and coffee to make me feel like an authentic private eye as I staked out Sell Phones, but that was as far away as I wanted to get.
I moved my Rover onto the street that ran at right angles to Beaumaris Road and the alley so that I had a good view of the end of Alien's car bonnet, though it meant losing sight of the front of the shop. I slid into the passenger seat to make it look as if I were waiting for someone and took off the cap. I kept the glasses in place, though. I slouched in my seat and brooded on Bill's per¬fidy. I sipped my coffee very slowly, just enough to keep me alert, not enough to make me want to pee. By the time I saw some action, the coffee was cold and so was I.
The nose of the silver Mazda slipped out of the alley¬way and turned left toward Cheetham Hill Road. Just on five, with traffic tight as hemoglobin in the bloodstream. Born lucky, that's me. I scrambled across the gear stick and started the engine, easing out into the road behind the car. As we waited to turn left at the busy main road, I had the chance to see who was in the car. Alien was dri¬ving, but there was also someone in the passenger seat. She conveniently reached over into the backseat for something, and I identified the woman who had been in Sell Phones talking to the Emporio Armani mannequin. I wondered if she was the other half of the scam, the woman who went out to chat up the widowers. They don't call me a detective for nothing.
The Mazda slid into a gap in the traffic heading into Manchester. I didn't. By the time I squeezed out into a space that wasn't really there, the Mazda was three cars ahead and I was the target of a car horn voluntary. I gave the kind of cheery wave that makes me crazy when ass¬holes do it to me and smartly switched lanes in the hope that